Report: Truckers Weigh Canceling Government Contracts Rather than Firing Unvaccinated Workers

The American Trucking Associations (ATA) are reportedly weighing whether to cancel government contracts rather than firing employees over President Biden’s vaccine mandate set to take effect in December. Such a decision to cancel government contracts would further increase the nation’s supply chain crisis.

“I am confident but with heavy heart recognize a vaccine mandate will mean less capacity for the government as a customer of freight,” Executive Vice President for Advocacy Bill Sullivan told Politico Sunday. “It has the potential to seriously impact military readiness.”

Sullivan also said Biden’s one size fits all plan to employees to become vaccinated will not just hurt the military’s readiness, such as deploying the National Guard and transport fuel for military vehicles, but also the supply chain across the board.

“I feel like the president has tried to be beautifully simple like this could apply to everybody, and by doing that, there will be an impact,” he said in reference the holiday season.

According to the ATA in September, only 50 percent of truckers are vaccinated. Moreover, President and CEO of ATA, Chris Spear, told CNN in October the industry is already short a record amount of drivers, 30 percent, which amounts to 80,000 truckers.

Other shipping organizations have also pushed back against Biden’s vaccine mandate. UPS, FedEx, and Amazon, represented by the Cargo Airline Association, demanded the Biden-Harris administration in late October extend the December deadline into 2022, noting a probable delay in shipping would occur to comply with Biden’s mandate.

“As everyone enters their high season, the Administration’s corporate COVID-19 vaccine mandate for government contractors threatens to be a major stumbling block in servicing our customers during the Holidays,” wrote Stephen Alterman, president of the Cargo Airline Association, Politico first reported. “This December 8 mandate comes at a time when the industry is already faced with a growing worker shortage — a shortage that is likely to expand if employees decide to quit or retire rather than become vaccinated.”

Members of the aerospace, distribution, defense and trucking sectors are warning the Biden administration they will not be able to meet its vaccine deadline https://t.co/YZsWEr9W89

— POLITICO (@politico) October 31, 2021

White House press secretary was asked Wednesday if the administration would consider delaying the mandate’s implementation.

“Well, I think it’s important for people to understand that the first step here is not firing or quitting; the first step is counseling, and sometimes there are alternative options as well,” she said. “Beyond that, I don’t have anything to predict or preview for you into in terms of a change of timeline.”

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has not released the rules of the mandate or how the agency would plan to enforce it. Yet companies have decided to go along with the future mandate, firing employees for not getting vaccinated.

Nevertheless, Biden’s he supply chain crisis has caused prices to rise and shelves have become bare. The supply chain crisis is expected to go into 2022 to 2023 with inflation curbing around the same time.

Follow Wendell Husebø on Twitter @WendellHusebø